ATP YECs - injuries, injuries, injuries
As injury-wracked as the WTA year-end championships were (and note that I managed to choose wrong in almost every match I called), the ATP YECs have been arguably worse.
The women were missing three of the four Grand Slam champions, Henin-Hardenne with a hamstring injury and both Williams sisters because they weren't ranked high enough to qualify (after missing much of the year through injury and/or apathy). But the YECs still had seven of the top eight -- everyone turned out for the YECs who qualified other than JHH. It was *Philadelphia* that bore the brunt of player withdrawals, at least some of which were almost certainly partially due to the players realizing they didn't need the points to qualify.
The men's YECs are down to only one of the top five, they're missing two of the year's three Grand Slam champions, and they're flying the 14th ranked player (Thomas Johansson) in from Monte Carlo to be an alternate in case anyone more pulls out. The worst, I think, was Agassi -- even if he was injured, this is the third time he's lost a match or two, then cried injury and gone home. Of course, he's 36, and it's almost impossible that he *doesn't* have some injury that's bothering him at any given time, but the pattern is striking. Safin's missed half a year, hard to argue with that; Nadal at least came out on court and apologized; Roddick always looked like a candidate for back problems the way he sticks his ass out when he serves; and Hewitt...well, I know his wife's having a baby, and one must approve of his desire to be by her side...but...oh, well, where's Concorde when you need it?
The YECs always looked like being Federer's tournament in any case. Roddick and Hewitt haven't beaten him on any surface in more than two years, Safin (who beat him in Australia) hasn't played in months, and Nadal is arguably still learning to play on faster surfaces (and said before he withdrew that he didn't like the Shanghai surface). Coria lost all his matches last year, and was predictably going to repeat the performance this year (and has so far); the alternates (Gaudio, Puerta) are clay-court players.
Of the draw, the players you'd expect to make the semis:
Federer
Ljubicic (Nalbandian's a versatile player, but Ljubicic has had a better record at the beginning and end of this year)
Davydenko
probably Gonzalez
Gonzalez is a tough pick: he's got a better game for fast courts than Gaudio or Puerta (both of whom are clay-courters even though Puerta can serve and volley), but he comes in at the disadvantage of not being prepared and having only two matches to play, both of which he has to win to qualify for the semis. But it's hard to choose against him, because of the surface.
Final picks: Federer vs Lubicic
To win: Federer.
Going back to the injury problems (and bear in mind that Federer only a few weeks ago was on crutches with an ankle injury he's apparently been able to rehab in time): the players keep saying that the season is too long and too brutal and that their bodies can't take it. Clearly *something* important has changed just in the last ten, maybe even five, years -- players got injured in the 1980s and 1990s, too, but not on this scale and in this quantity. There are lots of reasons that have been frequently mooted why this happens: the preponderance of hard courts, both on the tour and as training grounds for young players; the age at which kids start to play intensively now; the pace of the game; the schedule. But I think the overgrowth of money in the game is also a contributing factor, and one no one is talking about. When players *had* to have long careers if they hoped to retire in any comfort, they were forced to take better care of their bodies and think long-term. Now that you can be more than set for life with one big win (Sharapova's 2004 Wimbledon win netted her $21 million a year in endorsements, by most estimates), the rule seems to be to go for broke, cash in, and then you don't have to care what the promoters or anyone else needs. The exception is, of course, Federer, who genuinely seems to care about playing for history. But he *is* the exception, and he's also unusual in apparently limiting his off-court commitments.
wg